Pop Century/dining plan/character meals

[disneymarathoner07]

I have a couple of questions for anyone... My husband and our 2 daughters (ages 6 and 4) are coming down to Orlando from September 29-October 7th. We are looking at staying at the Pop Century. I read the reviews and they seemed to be good. The main complaint that I saw was the small size of the room--but we will only be in there to sleep and shower, so...I don't think that will be a problem. We are ready to make our reservations and are seriously considering the dining plan. I am all for it--My husband on the other hand is saying that's like 100 dollars a day on food--?? So I was wanting some opinions on that as well. I also saw that you could use one table service meal for a character dining meal but some character meals counted for 2 table service meals. I was wondering if anyone knew which character meals counted for what. Thanks, Amanda Land

 

[indigoxtreme]

okay the dining plan is great. Your dh and yourself will be 37.99 each and 10.99 per child. That is 97.96. This includes tips and tax for your meals. Look at www.allears.net for menus and cost. We found it to be great as we did not have to worry about meals as they were paid for and we did tip extra for great service. Usually 5% more. Look at the cost per meal. It is hard to feed a family at sit down meals and counter service meal and a snack a day for less than this. The character meals are mostley 1 table service credit, but the Cinderella meal is going to 2 credits in Feb. We enjoyed it as my DGD 4 yrs old did too. When doing the calulations don't forget the tip and tax. Most have found that it is a lot of food so on some of the cs meals and sit down meals that are not character, buffet or all you can eat, you can share and sprea d them out over your time to include a few breakfast.

 

[Yellow_Stitch]

I think the only character meal that takes 2 credits is Cinderella's castle in the Magic Kingdom. As for the expense of the plan, you can almost always come out ahead using the plan. If you want to eat frugally you can spend less than the plan, but if you want to eat at some neat places, the plan is the way to go. $100 does seem high, but only until you look at the prices at the restaurants. You can easily spend much more off the plan. It also includes tip, so that lessens the cost. When a hot dog and fries is $9.50, your dining bill will add up.

 

[my2boys1821]

Our boys will be the same ages as your girls when we go in June. We went back and forth on the whole meal deal. We decided to go ahead with the meal plan because we didn't feel like eating fast food for 7 days all meals. We wanted to try some nice sit down restaurants. We went through all the menus and picked out the restaurants that we thought we'd enjoy the most. When you price out appetizers, entrees, desserts and drinks for 2 adults it adds up very quickly. Not that we could possibly eat all that food. But even just the entrees avg $20/adult. Another thing I am happy about is not having to keep up with a certain amount of money for food. All of our "money" can be spent on souvoneirs!!!!!!

 

[PaulaSue]

We just got back yesterday...5 (Ash is 2) of us in CBR was a little tight floor space with the bags (7) and that is with the 3 girls sharing a bed. I don't know about Pop but I hear it is much smaller.

For the Dining plan I think it is SO worth it!!!! With Ash under 3 we only had to pay for 2 adults and 2 children. We ate like royalty. Just for counter service meals it was $40 for 4 meals (2 A and 2 C) at the park each day and even with sharing with ash we had a lot of food extra. At the table service meals the price tag was about $25 for each entree and you also the app ($5-$10), a drink, dessert and tip covered.

We Actually came home without using all the snack and table service credits since there was so much food. Plus the best part was not having to get cash out all the time, it was linked to the room key.

The Character meals we so magical!!!!! I heard the Castle meal is going up soon but it and all the other ones we did were only 1 credit each. We will Defenitely be doing them again! We didn't find Mulan or Jasmine anywhere to meet (were in the parades) when we finally got to meet them in the Storybook breakfast in Norway. It was the prefect way to end our trip and celebrate Emma's birthday!!! They even did a little something special for her that topped the day.

 

[IwannaseeMickey]

The DP is a great deal if you have small children and you want to do table service/char. meals. By the time you do one char. dinner and have a snack you've already spent at least $40, and on the plan you also get a counter service. We got it free last year w/ t promo, but I'd book it again in a heartbeat. Plus, I'd much rather pay for it upfront and then not have to worry about every penny spent at each restaurant. I'd do it! You will easily spend $100 a day in the park otherwise!

 

[dimoe]

I went last May for the first time with my hubbie and daughter. We stayed at pop and have enough room. We thought the same way sleep and shower . We were on the dining plan and I say it is well worth it. You can try a lot of different restaurants and no worries about cost really. We did a lot of character meals that ran us close to 100.00 with just us. Also if you wanted you can share some table service ones with them or they can share that way you will have even more ts and cs . It is a lot of food ts- appetizer, entree and dessert, cs -entree and dessert. I also loved the all you can eat buffets so did my hubbie. We loved pop and would stay there again and we loved the dining plan and would do this again too !
Diane

 

[disneyaggie]

I love staying at Pop Century! Be sure to ask for a room REAL close to the main lobby -- if not, you will end up in another state! I would make sure that they do not charge you extra for this -- I have a room that I will be requesting again because I love the location. And, if you don't like your room location, find a couple of room locations once you get there and they will move you to one near that one that is available -- and they will even move your luggage for you! Sweet!

Also -- Pop is a very value hotel (emphasis on the word "value"). Before check-in, make sure you call ahead and ask for a blow dryer in your room (no, I am not kidding). They also don't have coffee pots in there. That is not a big deal for me since I don't drink coffee, but it may be traumatic for some folks!

I also did the meal plan, but it was free with a MYW package special they had in September. I thought I was going to pop! And incredible amount of food. I am going in May and do not plan to use the meal plan this time. But if you like several table service meals, this might be a way to go. Perhaps check out www.allearsnet.com and check out the places you would like to go and their prices. This may help you in putting pen-to-paper to see which is more cost effective for you. I usually just like to make one, maybe two table reservations, and run and snack on hamburgers, hotdogs or something else the rest of the time.

Have fun!